The infamous “Arbeit Macht Frei” sign from the Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz, stolen last month and recovered two days later, was Thursday returned to the museum there. 

Bartosz Bartyzel, a spokesman for the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum, told AFP that investigators had handed over the sign which had hung over the gate of the camp in occupied Poland since World War II.

“Our conservation experts will now examine it to determine how to restore it,” Bartyzel said.

“Only after that will the museum management and the International Auschwitz Committee decide whether or not to put it back in place,” he added.

The museum placed a copy of the sign over the gate immediately after the theft.

The need to restore the original, which thieves had cut into three pieces, means it is certain not to be back in place in time for ceremonies on January 27 marking the 65th anniversary of the camp’s liberation by Soviet troops.
  
The 16-foot metal sign was stolen on December 18 from the site of the camp on the outskirts of the southern Polish city of Oswiecim.

Police recovered it two days later in northern Poland and forensic experts have since been examining it as evidence.

Police arrested and charged five Polish men over the theft. A Swedish former neo-Nazi has also been indicted and Poland is seeking his extradition.

(Source: EJP / AFP)